Aftermaths
by Evilgoddss
Summary: In the wake of the disaster at the lab, a brief snippet of discussion about nothing and everything passes between two CSI’s. Speculation on
1. Default Chapter

Aftermaths  
  
In the wake of the disaster at the lab, a brief moment of discussion about nothing and everything passes between two CSI's.  
  
Disclaimer: No infringement on the rights and property are intended by the writing of this brief story. No profit is being made.  
  
Spoilers: Speculation on "Play With Fire".  
  
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She stood quietly at the doorway, her face expressionless in the harsh fluorescent lighting overhead that made the bandage covering the stitches over her forehead stand out so appallingly in her pale face. "Sara?" Grissom cleared his throat when her name became choked on his lips. "Sara?" He tried again. "Is something wrong?"  
  
She shook her head, a minute action that still made her wince. "You should be at home, resting." He prodded, gentle in his own way. "The doctor said -- "  
  
"I know." She cut him off, her bandaged wrist waving at him. "I was there too, Gris. I just... how's Greg doing?"  
  
"Fine." Grissom slid his glasses off his nose and dropped them carelessly to the rough surface serving as a temporary desk. They bounced off the open folder and clattered onto the metal desktop itself finding the only clear space available. The lab was completely shut down, for now, barring him from his office. Reconstruction had begun, now that the investigation as the cause of the explosion was over, but it would take a week or two to repair and replace all the damages. The samples that had been lost, however, were irreplaceable and that was what worried him most now. At least, that and Sara.  
  
God, what a week. What a nightmare. He wasn't quite sure his heart had yet recovered from the shock of seeing Sara collapsed and hurt. And Greg. God. He shook his head. It was so much easier when the victims weren't people he knew, when the blood wasn't their blood and they weren't so damnably still.  
  
"Gris?" She sounded so tired, as tired as he felt. Small wonder, she was bruised, battered, she had stitches in her head and was probably in shock from the explosion and fire itself.  
  
"He's fine." Grissom sighed, rubbing his eyes wearily. "Awake. Alert. His parents are flying up to stay with him once he's released."  
  
She nodded, again a small miniscule action since her neck and shoulders were so tender. She needed to be wrapped with heating pads, cuddled up in her bed. Preferably with him there to coddle her until she could stand it no more. Like it or not, in this case he WAS emotionally involved. "I should visit him." She mused.  
  
"I'll take you." He offered immediately. It'd have to be tomorrow, anyway. Visiting hours were over for the evening. Which brought him right back to where his thoughts had started. "You should go home and get some rest, Sara. We could go visit Greg tomorrow."  
  
Was it his imagination, or did she just seem to gray some more, exhaustion setting in heavily onto her thin body. Had she eaten today? Would she read into it too much if he asked?  
  
"Gris?" She scuttled a little further into his temporary office, not so far as to be actually IN the office, but definitely on the other side of the doorframe. She leaned back against the wall, letting it bear her weight for her. "Can-- can I ask you something?"  
  
The Monarch Butterflies that had taken up residence in his gut this past twenty-four hours went berserk. She wasn't going to ask for another LOA, was she? He couldn't take it if she vanished, not right now. Not with everything else. His hearing, the explosion, Greg... Sara. "Sure." He croaked hoarsely, facing the firing squad head on.  
  
"Do you..." She licked her lips. "When you said... I." She took a deep breath in and expelled it shakily. "Oh, this is stupid." She decided, partially turning to leave.  
  
"Sara? What?"  
  
She shook her head again. "It's just my good people skills. The ones I don't have." She laughed, a hollow dry sound without any real good humor. "I just-- after the explosion when I was hurt and you showed up -- I started to wonder. The last six months and all. Are we still friends? I mean. Like before?"  
  
Oh, how to answer this. It was a fork in the road, one leaving to damnation, and the other leading to pain. Were they still friends like before? When he was her mentor and she was that brilliant student that so caught his mind afire? "No." He answered softly. "Not like before."  
  
Her eyes were miserable. "Oh."  
  
"Sara -- don't." He chided her before she could run away and wallow miserably in the wrong interpretation. "You're not the student anymore." He tried to explain. "You're my equal. Well," He smiled deprecatingly. "I'm still your supervisor so that gives me a little inch up, but we're equals. We work together, and yes we're friends. Just with equality now."  
  
She blinked, a single tear running down her cheek. Yes, she was given to the odd emotional outburst, but this was different. This was pain mingled with exhaustion and the human spirit pushed beyond some point of endurance. "Oh." She swallowed, it seemed like it was around some massive lump for the pronounced effort it took her. "So, I mean something to you? I'm not just an employee or something?"  
  
"Yes, Sara." He nodded. "You're not just an employee. Go, home. Rest." He urged her. "You're exhausted, you're hurt and you need to heal. I'll pick you up around 2 to visit Greg, how does that sound?"  
  
Her feet shuffled softly against the hard flooring almost restlessly, and her eyes burned into his face for a long moment. Somehow he kept his face neutral until she finally nodded and turned to leave. He watched her leave, and his eyes traced her shadow as it thinned and vanished on the floor in the hall. Then, and only then, he dropped his head into his hands and closed his eyes to will back away the tidal wave of heartache that swamped him. "God, Sara. You mean everything." He whispered helplessly. "Everything. And I can't do a damn thing about it." 


	2. Conversations with Greg

Aftermaths  
  
Disclaimer: No infringement on the rights and property are intended by the writing of this brief story. No profit is being made.  
  
Spoilers: Speculation on "Play With Fire".  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*  
  
"Are the samples okay?" Greg Sanders first words to Grissom startled the older man tremendously.  
  
"The samples?" Grissom repeated dumbly, his mind struggling to make the right turn at the last second. Did the kid get brain damaged on top of his other injuries? What did the evidence samples matter, when the explosion had put him and Sara in a hospital? To hell with the samples! Yes, they were a tremendous loss, but ultimately with careful diligence could be replaced. Replacing Greg and Sara? Grissom's mind shuddered. Replacing Sara - he'd rather die than live in a world without her. Even if he couldn't be with her, per se.  
  
"The evidence samples. From the open cases." The young technician coughed a bit, obviously straining his lungs by trying to talk so urgently. He pressed the button at the side of the automatic bed and raised the upper portion, raising his upper body to a reclining but still somewhat upright position. It was easier to converse like that.  
  
"Greg." Grissom shook his head and pulled a chair from beside the vacant bed on the other side of the small semi-private hospital room over to Greg's side before sitting down in it. Did the younger man seriously believe that he'd prioritize work over the well being of his people? Was he that tough a supervisor? That cold? "The samples aren't important. You are." If anything, the disheveled hair from lying in a hospital bed had tamed his otherwise wild cut. It didn't, however, improve the look of the younger man with all the bruises and cuts visible on his pale thin face.  
  
Greg blinked. He paused with his mouth dropping open and then clearly shaking himself out of a state of stunned awareness he shut his mouth. If the look he was giving Grissom was the same as he gave to a sample through the 'scope, it was no wonder that Sanders was the best forensic technician that Grissom had ever worked with. It was just that intense. Maybe he should reconsider and let Sanders explore the field more.  
  
"Alright." Greg nodded slowly. "Who are you and what have you done with Dr. Grissom?"  
  
Grissom rolled his eyes heavenward. This was why he had never wanted to start a family. The punches just didn't stop coming from the prankster, no matter how banged up and doped up they were on pain medications. "Very funny, Greg. You do realize that I value the lives of my people more than the evidence."  
  
It was impressive how, even laid up in a hospital bed with broken limbs, bruises, fractured ribs and oh yes, the fact he was technically recovering from surgery to stop the internal bleeding, Greg could still look sheepish and guilty. "Sorry, Gris."  
  
"Uh huh. Why would you think the samples were more important than you and Sara?"  
  
"Oh not Sara. I know Sara's top priority to you." It popped out completely unsupervised. Grissom KNEW that by the wild look in Greg's eyes and the sudden reddening of the man's face. "Did I just say that aloud?"  
  
"You did." Grissom nodded gravely, torn between smiling with amusement and bolting from the room in terror that Greg knew what Grissom had been desperately trying to bury. "Care to explain that little salvo?" His little discussion with Sara last night had left him feeling unhinged already. He didn't think he could take more.  
  
"Not really, thanks."  
  
"Greg."  
  
"You're jockeying for her." Greg blurted again. "Everyone knows it."  
  
Oh, the urge to run was getting stronger. He suddenly knew how wild animals felt when their survival instincts kicked in. Everyone knew? Who was everyone and how the hell could they know anything? He didn't even know anything! "Beg your pardon?" He really hoped he managed a dignified tone of incredulity, or at least any dignified tone of anything other than the squeak he was sure he had uttered. "I'm what?"  
  
"You know what I mean." If Greg could have scuffed a foot on the floor instead of lying trapped in his hospital bed with the IV running in his arms he would have. As it was, he stared down at the foot of his bed sullenly and clearly embarrassed. "You want her. I don't know why you won't make a move on her. She clearly has a thing for you too. You both just do this weird flirt thing, and then some referee rings a bell none of us can hear and you're back into your corners avoiding each other like it never happened. It's exhausting for those of us around you, y'know. Keeping score isn't easy. And the sexual tension is enough to drive us all to drink."  
  
Sexual tension? Grissom clamped his fingers around the edge of the chair rails, knuckles whitening in the death-grip he was maintaining on it. "Greg. Sara is a friend. I've known her since she was in Grad school. What makes you think?" He trailed off helplessly. 'What makes you think that she would want anything to do with an old deaf man like me?' That had been on the very tip of his tongue. "What makes you imagine there's more to our friendship?"  
  
Greg snorted, leaning back into his rather flat pillow. "Spare me." He muttered. "If you want an analysis on the way the two of you dance around each other, or the puppy-dog look that you have on your face when Sara doesn't know you're staring at her then talk to Catherine." He paused for a moment, and then sighed. "Look, it's none of my business but why don't you do something about it?"  
  
Grissom's throat felt more than constricted. If they had to put him on a respirator, he wasn't sure how they'd bypass his very closed throat. Do something about it? Do something? It was all he could do not to make an ass of himself and have Sara laugh in his face, and Greg wanted him to do something about it? "Greg.."  
  
Greg shook his head. "Never mind. Dumb question." He sighed again. "Can we go back to the samples? Did they find them?"  
  
"The lab was on fire, Greg. the samples and machines were destroyed." Surely someone had told Greg this already? Nick? Maybe Warrick? Sara couldn't have. She hadn't been released until late yesterday and Catherine had driven her straight to the temporary lab. Since she was still with the doctor now having her wrist re-examined now that the swelling had gone down, well - surely someone had told Greg about the extent of the damage?  
  
Greg snorted. "I don't mean THOSE samples. I mean the ones in the safe."  
  
Okay. Maybe Greg and Sara weren't the only casualities from the explosion. Possibly, he, himself, had attained some smoke-inhalation causing brain damage on some level. There had to be something wrong with him since he sure was having problems following this conversation. "The safe?"  
  
"The fire-safe." Greg prodded irritably. "I only use a tiny quant of what you guys give me to run my tests, the rest are secured in case there's contamination or we need to re-run. I'm not getting my ass chewed for poor samples management." Obviously, at some point in the past someone had given Greg a chewing out for just that. Ecklie.  
  
Still, at that precise moment, Grissom felt the overwhelming urge to land one big smacker on Greg's face. "You lock everything up in the fire-safe?" He breathed, his weary eyes sparkling to life as this new knowledge danced through his brain, setting his world on fire with relief. "Everything?"  
  
Greg nodded.  
  
Ah, to hell with it. Sara was okay! His favorite tech was alive! His evidence wasn't lost or worse destroyed! Without giving it a second thought as to how uncharacteristic it was, Grissom jumped up and carefully hugged his very battered lab tech. "I think I love you." He chortled, stepping back. "Every bad thing I've every criticized you for - I take it back! All of it! Even about the loud music in the lab. I love you just the way you are!"  
  
The choked squawk from Greg definitely made Grissom want to chuckle. "Now, now. there is no loving this man. I'm strictly hetero-sexual, Gris."  
  
Grissom let the chuckle loose, paternally patting the top of Greg's head. "So you say. Frequently." Perhaps it was just the relief of moving away from the Sara conversation, but - the evidence was safe. Greg and Sara were alive. Life was good!  
  
"I am. Very." Greg watched him nervously. "Err. you're just happy about the samples, right. there's no real loving going on, right?"  
  
Oh, it was so easy when the audience was captive. And, after the little drama and torture he'd just endured plus months of Greg's annoying little stunts. some revenge was owed. "Oh, Greggo. wouldn't you just like to know." And he let a small enigmatic smile sweep across his face.  
  
Fin /2  
  
Author's Note: I have no idea how long this will go on. Just a series of random thoughts as the dust settles from an episode I'm only speculating on. Feedback is appreciated. 


End file.
